


What Monsters Don't Need

by thethrillof



Category: The Batman (Cartoon)
Genre: Arkham Asylum
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-12
Updated: 2017-05-12
Packaged: 2018-10-30 22:02:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10885800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thethrillof/pseuds/thethrillof
Summary: Onething they don't, at least.





	What Monsters Don't Need

_Names have power._

He used to have a name. A “real” name, according to the pack of doctors that try to dissect him with their eyes, since even in Arkham they can’t just pick up scalpels to cut away at his scales.

_Mm. But Joker does too, doesn’t he?_

It’s almost flatterin’, that they consider him, Killer Croc, more human than Joker.

They put him behind glass you can fire missiles at without makin’ a scratch, electric collars to lock around his throat, but at least some of them look at him with fear and hate and _stubbornness_ and try to fix him.

Joker’s as monstrous as they come. Nobody does anything but go through the motions with him. _Almost_ flattering, he thinks again, sourly, watching a doc scribble over a little palm notebook.

They don’t even call him Killer Croc half the time. Just _the patient_ or _you_. It’s pathetically amusing sometimes, rankling and obnoxious others. Mostly the latter.

His boys asked, once, not too long after their little introduction.  Practically tripped over themselves to make him feel included. He smiled enough for ‘em to see all his teeth, since they were starin’ anyway.

 _Names have power, boys, don’t you forget it_ , is all that he says. Killer Croc is all they need.

That’s probably what sparks off the gossip he gambled with voodoo. Now, he finds _that_ hilarious. That’s not what he meant at all.

Maybe he’s envious of Joker, loathe as he is to admit it, watching the clown cackle while being wheeled past in the extra-security sector. Nobody tries to _humanize_ him, find out his name–not often, anyway–tries to think of him as less as he is.

A monster, through and through, even with the mask of politeness he keeps up. He doesn’t mind keeping his pets fed, whether they’re one-hundred-percent crocodile or mid-tier thieves. That doesn’t make him what the doctors want him to be. There’s no _cure_. There’s no _name_.

Killer Croc doesn’t want to be _humanized_.


End file.
